Allan Houston Quotations

Success isn't always going to be a huge contract; success is going to be if you just live out your purpose in life.

The more consistent a father can be or a mentor can be in the person's life and teach them principles of real solid manhood, character, integrity and leadership, the more consistent you can be in the person's life and teach them those things at a younger age, and then the better off they'll be.

What you do on the court, off the court, in the classroom, it's all the same. Your habits, the way you treat class, your relationships - it's all the same. Do it right or don't do it.

There are so many issues in society - we talk about the violence, the drugs, the unwanted pregnancies - but at the end of the day, it comes down to what we taught our children to be.

If it had been what was supposed to happen, it would have happened.

We don't want to put a band-aid on our problems that we keep talking about in society; we want to get down to the nitty gritty and do some surgery.

Seven years ago, my father and I realized that our relationship was extremely unique, especially in the African-American community. He raised me to not only understand the fundamentals of basketball and to try to be a player with a high basketball IQ, but he wanted me to understand that my image and my name meant more than stats.

You know what I like to do? I love waking up early, making them breakfast, taking them to school, having time in the morning with them. With six kids, it's like a reality show.

Every NBA player, every athlete, I think once you get to this level in life, whether you have kids or you're about to have kids, understands that this is so much bigger than this sport.

First of all, as a man the most important thing you have in your life now is your child that you're carrying. That's it. Everything else comes second; personally, for me, other than your relationship with God and your wife.

There are so many guys that come up and have strong hearts, but they just have to understand what the consequences are and how to execute the things that they learned to make themselves successful.

We're going to give it a couple of days to settle down and just keep doing what we've been doing, ... I'm not really overreacting to anything. It's just that you've got to give it time. I haven't really been doing it. Once you're going at full speed, your body has to respond to it. You have to let it do it at its own pace.

When we beat Indiana, I really don't remember anything about the game, ... I just remember running around and hugging my teammates, hugging Jeff and seeing the fans react to us, that we got back to the Finals.

Let's pray for Jim Dolan. Let's pray for our organization.

Now we are trying to do something positive for them.

Right now I can't play. I'm not really healthy. It's not really to the point where it's healed. It's been a long time that I've been playing injured and I've been doing a lot of damage to my knees for a long time.

I don't have to come back, but I really want to. I really want to play and I believe God wants me to. And that's the one thing I've been very adamant about saying. It's been hard.

I always wanted to be in those moments where you could have an opportunity to win a game with a play or a shot, or have a part in it, ... I've been very fortunate to have a lot of those moments. Miami was probably the single moment that stands out. If I had a Knick memory that would stand out, that would be it.

I always wanted to be in those moments when you could have an opportunity to win the game,

I feel that it is in the best interests of my family and the franchise that I move on.

I did everything I possibly could to get back and finish my career the way I would have liked to. My injuries just wouldn't let me do it.

I exhausted everything, ... If it was supposed to happen it would have happened. It just was not supposed to and I'm comfortable with that.

I don't think it's realistic to judge it off of training camp, honestly. Once we get back and we're not practicing twice a day and I give it some time to recover, then I'll have a better (assessment).

God has overwhelmed me with blessings, and I am led to share them with others,

I always said that I would be back and told the fans that I would be back, and I always truly in my heart believed that, ... But sometimes your will, your passion, your competitiveness, kind of override what your body is going through, and I was strictly running off of those emotions and that will.

Going at this intensity is new, so I'm going to have to just continue to adjust.

I almost fought back a lot of tears, honestly. It was great, a wonderful feeling. The last time I'd been in this building with a crowd was when I played.

Over the last two years, I have done everything I could possibly do to get back on the court, but injuries to my knee would not allow me to do it.

Like Steph said, you almost feel guilty because there are people 10 hours from us that have lost everything, ... But this is something that we're supposed to do.

Miami probably was the single moment that stands out. Those are the moments you dream about, and I was fortunate to have it happen to me.

Yeah, I do feel it, ... I think going at this intensity is new ... The biggest thing is how much rest it's going to have to have in between. That's what's going to be determined. It's still a work in progress.

Training is different than going 100 miles per hour with a coach Brown team, ... That's the ultimate test. I tried it. The reason I didn't give it another chance was because I said, 'I've given it so many chances and tried everything I possibly could.' I had to really reflect and get past what you want, your desire, what you're willing to go through and say, 'What is really the right plan for me right now?'

What I will say is the retirement thing is something I've been laughing at, you should be laughing at, everybody should be laughing at, ... It is kind of frustrating. As much as I've communicated to everyone that I'm not going to retire, it's like people still don't know. I'm not going to retire. I'm still going to play.

Even though I wasn't practicing twice a day, I was still doing some stuff, ... So it just really didn't have any time to recover. I don't think it's fair to judge it off training camp, though.

It was a challenge. You can kind of take it the wrong way and take it personally, but New York fans are passionate. They want to say, 'If I had that skill and that ability and that body, that's how I would play.' I knew that, but you have to put yourself in other people's shoes sometimes. All I could do is do what I could do. Even with the pain, the contract was a blessing. All I did was do everything to the best of my ability.

You see something like this, driving around in your car, walking around in your house, like Steph said, you almost feel guilty because there are people who have lost everything. I just want to encourage everyone to do something.

They've been really respectful and cooperative, ... I think the trainers have been good about how we're doing this and everyone's been communicating. At the same time, I don't want to be disruptive, either, to Coach (Larry Brown) and to Isiah and to the team. I want to make sure I'm doing whatever I can and my body's making the right progress.

They're young. There hasn't been a lot of consistency with players. Hopefully when the organization can gain some momentum through some consistency with some players and the coach being there a couple of years. That's really how you start to build it back.

It's tough, it really is. But once they get past this hurdle I think they'll be fine.

At the same time I don't want to be disruptive either, ... I want to make sure I'm doing whatever I can and my body is making the right progress.

The fans of New York were unbelievable, ... I want to thank the fans for not only supporting me, but challenging me.

I'm not going to retire, ... I believe in my heart that I'm going to be back. It would be nice to play two more years here and get close to winning a championship.

I hope that all of our fans realize how much of an honor and privilege it was to represent them and New York at Madison Square Garden for all of these years,

I guess, ... that sums it all up.

I just don't have it in my mind that I'm not going to be able to come back, honestly.

I pictured this day for a long time but I didn't think it was going to happen so soon. ... I did everything that I possibly could to get back and finish my career the way I would have like to. But the injury wouldn't allow me to do that. This is the right time for me to move on.

He's an impact player, ... He's one of those guys that when you play against him, you say, 'Man, if we had him, it'd be nice.'

I feel a little bit of pain here and there,